This invention relates to brace elements for use in building and home construction, and more particularly concerns a spacing brace which can be quickly and easily utilized to temporarily interconnect a series of parallel wooden structural members.
In the construction of buildings, wooden structural members known as studs, joists, trusses and rafters are generally utilized wherein a number of such members are equidistantly disposed in a parallel array. The distance between said members is generally determined by measuring with a ruler and/or utilizing wooden strips of 1.times.2 inch or 1.times.4 inch cross section which are removably nailed into the structural members for temporary securement. Repeated measurements can be time-consuming and susceptible to random errors. Furthermore, after the structural members are fixed in their desired positions, any temporary wooden strips and their holding nails must be removed to permit the roof, wall or floor sheeting to be installed. Not only is such removel time-consuming, but the wooden strips are frequently discarded as scrap, resulting in the waste of expensive lumber and presenting a disposal problem.
It is also well known to nail bracing elements called ties between adjacent beams once the parallel array is formed in order to strangthen the array. Such procedure improves lateral stability and distributes loading forces throughout the array, but does not facilitate the initial positioning of the structural members.
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide apparatus to efficiently and economically position and engage wooden structural members such as trusses, joists, studs and rafters in an equidistantly spaced parallel array of a number of said structural members.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide apparatus as in the foregoing object capable of repeated re-use.
It is another object of the invention to provide apparatus of the aforesaid nature adapted to accommodate a last member of said array whose spacing from the penultimate member is different than the uniform spacing between other members of the array.
It is a still further object of this invention to provide apparatus of the aforesaid nature adapted to stabilize said array of structural members during construction work which eventually consolidates said array into a durable structure.
It is yet another object of the instant invention to provide a spacing apparatus which is easily utilized and amenable to economical manufacture.
These objects and other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description.